


She said, don't scare the guests, that's what the dogs are for

by girl_wonder



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Alternate Universe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-05-28
Updated: 2011-05-28
Packaged: 2017-10-19 20:43:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,906
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/205015
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/girl_wonder/pseuds/girl_wonder
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The school sat at the edge of town. AU.</p>
            </blockquote>





	She said, don't scare the guests, that's what the dogs are for

The school sat on the edge of the town, hulking over the lake. By winter, the trees around the lake had already dropped the last of their leaves onto the water, floating until the wind blew them down, down beneath the surface. Nothing reflected in the water, no mountains, no buildings. The long, low pier that was nearly too crooked to walk on didn't cast a reflection.

There was only the sky, hanging overhead gray and reflecting a perfect blue. No one knew how many students had gathered the heavy rocks along the shore, dropped them into their uniform pockets, and waded into the cool water that didn't reflect anything but inaccurate sky. They didn't count the students that died like that.

None of the students would run away – where was there to go? When someone went missing, his bed was given to a new student and his things were burned. It was the way things worked.

In the system there were schools for everything now, schools for cooks, schools for artists, schools for servants. But this had been one of the first founded, and the students could be proud of that. No one remembered what the building had been before; maybe it had always been a school.

It felt like it had always been a school. The gym was worn from years of sneakers and the beds were sagging from endless bodies tossing and turning on endless nights.

Outside, the vines crawled up the windowpanes, leaving a thick residue when the gardeners scraped them off. The light from the outside was gray anyway, barely more useful than a candle. No one minded. The type of learning they did didn't require thick texts with small print and long footnotes.

This school only taught one subject: how to forget.

*****

Danny said, "New kid."

Dean looked over, uncertainly, watched the tall kid slip between the pair of girls tossing a tennis ball between them. Something about him was familiar. "Not new," Dean said.

"I must have forgotten him," Danny said. He shrugged and moved his white pawn to check the black king.

"I'm playing white," Dean said. He shook his head, shaking off the fuzzy echo inside his own mind. The last few moments fell away like snow and he felt chilled, looking down at the board.

"I'm black?" Danny said, puzzled.

"Yeah." Dean nodded and moved a white knight into check-mate. He reached up towards his neck, and his fingers brushed his tie.

"Should we play a new game?" Danny asked, his eyes uncertain and blue the way that Dean thought the sky should be, the way it was reflected in the lake.

He flashed to wheat fields and a car, driving just this side of the speed limit, with the wind making the fields ripple gold. He thought he remembered someone's thick fingers curled around the steering wheel, scarred and slightly hairy.

This time, he took a moment, staring off towards the lake, and didn't shake off the memory until Danny touched his shoulder with something like wonder. "Do you remember something, Dean?"

"Naw," Dean grinned and the harder he tried to hold onto it, the more the memory twisted in his mind until it was nothing.

"You ever wonder what we're supposed to be forgetting?" Danny asked, quietly, as he set the pieces back on the board.

To his right, there were two girls tossing a green ball back and forth and Dean stared at their game for a while. The motion was repetitive, and he could see the muscle memory in it. _What the mind doesn't remember, the body can._

Dean shivered.

"They've been there for a while," Danny said, quietly. "If you forgot."

"What was your question?" Dean asked, suddenly. He moved a pawn, watched Danny counter.

"I can't remember," Danny said. He was looking at the board, though. It was a bad lie, and by now they were all good liars. Had to lie to cover what you forgot, and had to lie to cover what you remembered.

Dean picked a small brown leaf off the table. He twisted it in his fingers, twirling the star until the leaf snapped off from its stem. It floated to the ground, and Dean ground it to pieces under his shoe.

*****

"You aren't new," Dean said, when he and Danny came into their room. The tall kid was pacing back and forth in their room, his stuff thrown on the third bed, not put in his trunk yet.

"I'm a new freshman," the kid said, staring at Dean strangely. "I only got here today. I'm Sam."

Frowning at Dean, Danny said, "Danny. That's Dean. I dunno what they're thinking bunking a frosh with two seniors."

Danny tossed the chess set onto his desk and then threw himself back onto his bed, relaxing into the mattress. Rolling his eyes, Dean kicked the mattress so it shook.

"Danny. C'mon, man, _rules_."

"Fuck off," Danny said, and rolled to his side. The window light hit his hair and a cheekbone and left the rest of his face in shadow.

With a deep sigh, Dean said, "Ok, fine. I'll do it."

"Do what?" Sam asked. He was hunching his shoulders, rounding them so that he looked almost disfigured.

He was still taller than Dean.

"Rules. Tour. Dinner." Dean grabbed his jacket out of the closet and said, "You can have the space left in the closet. The trunk at the end of the bed's yours."

Sam nudged it with his toe. "I looked in it, but there was already stuff in there."

Straightening his collar in the mirror, Dean adjusted his tie again, searching beneath the shirt for something he didn't have any more. The light shifted a little and when he glanced over, a vine had divided the window in two.

"Your stuff now," Dean said. "There's an incinerator in the basement if you don't want it."

"Whose was it before?" Sam paused on the question, biting it into smaller pieces. "Before I got here?"

"Don't remember," Dean said. He tried to think of who their third roommate had been. Someone short, maybe? With dark hair and light eyes. Or someone oversized, with too much meat on his bones.

The memories melted, cold and unforgiving.

"Come on, let's get going. Dinner's soon."

Dean reached onto the bed and tossed Sam one of his issued jackets, the school crest stitched neatly onto the breast.

Sam shrugged it on fluidly and closed the door behind him when he left. He was still watching Dean, head cocked and his eyes glancing around every doorway they passed.

"Rules are simple," Dean said. "Forget everything. Don't bother teachers after class. Don't remember anything from before. Report anyone trying to remember."

He jerked his thumb at the library door. "Library."

Across he pushed open the cafeteria. "Caf."

Starting down the hall, Dean headed towards the basketball court when Jessie grabbed his arm as he passed her.

"Dean," she said. Her eyes were deep brown, and he grinned, pushing a curl of hair out of her face so he could see them better.

"Jessie," he said, just as quietly. "We still on for the weekend?"

Jerking away from him, she shook her head. "I forgot and ended up with Michael. Sorry."

Dean watched her hurry down the hallway, skirt skimming the back of her legs. When he turned back to Sam, Sam was looking at him strangely.

"What does she mean?"

With a slight sigh, Dean stuffed his hands into his pockets, reassuring himself.

"Sometimes we forget things from the now, not just from the _then_ , you know? It means she's already with Michael."

He opened up the door to the gym, practice mats set up on one side of the court, boys in a pick-up game on the other side of the court.

"Winchester! You in?" A shorter kid, dark hair, waited half a second for a response before turning back to the game.

"Andy." Sam's voice cracked on the word, and he turned away, abruptly. His long legs took him quickly towards the door to the outside.

Following him, Dean said, "What? Do you know him from the then?"

Sam shrunk down again, shoulders and body trying to get away from the eyes of students. On their faces was slight confusion, and there would be for a few days. They all asked what Danny had wanted to know: _new or forgotten?_

"Sam," Dean said. "C'mon, man. It's a little rough, yeah, when you see people from the then. But you know, you forget pretty soon. It won't matter."

"They... _he_ told me Andy was dead," Sam turned towards a tree, looked like he might hit it for a second. "I thought he was dead."

Dean shook his head. "Andy's not dead. C'mon, let's go get dinner."

"I think I'll stay out here," Sam said, looking towards the lake, then looking back towards the village.

Dean grabbed his arm, unthinking, jerking him towards the caf. "Don't. You can't get away here. There's nowhere to go, and you just end up back here. Play along, Sammy."

Sam pulled back, with a slight sound, like Dean had punched him. "What did you say?"

"For a while, you just have to pretend. It's part of the deal." Dean shook his head. The leaves were thick and damp underfoot. He kicked and got water on the cuff of his pants.

"What did you call me?" Sam said, choked and awful.

"Sammy?" Tilting his head a little, Dean looked up at Sam and got a sudden flash, the sun too bright in the overcast sky.

His hands were holding on to two smaller ones, fingernails filed down. They were at a lake, not the school lake, but a summer lake with innertubes floating in the middle and screams of play in the distance. The hands Dean held were at the end of long, bony arms, submerged in water.

He was counting seconds, _twenty, twenty-one, twenty-two_. At _thirty_ , the body attached to the hands burst through the water and shattered the memory.

Shivering, Dean looked around for Sam.

"You want me to call you something else?" He tried to trail back their conversation and came up empty, half-remembering what had started it. Had he called Sam Sammy? Or did Sam want him to call him Sammy?

"It's Sam," Sam said, shortly. He looked hurt and vibrant all at once.

Smoothly, Dean said, "Yeah. Sure."

He held open the door for Sam, and herded him towards the cafeteria, following the clumps of other students, the half-hearted yells and the blank shuffle. Sam was the only one who turned to look when there was a sharp bang from the dorms, the sound echoing well off of the sharp corners.

Glancing over at Sam, Dean sighed, heavily. He'd already told Sam the rules, and if Sam wanted to go off remembering on his first day, that was his deal. Still, he trailed after Sam as he pushed through the students towards the noise.

Dean followed in Sam's wake. It was easy to keep an eye on the kid – now that he had a goal, his back straightened and he was easily 6 feet. Out of the main hallway, Dean caught up to Sam, taking the stairs two at a time.

"Where're you going?" Dean asked.

Sam snapped his head to the left, then the right. He seemed to be looking for something. "That sound," Sam said. "It came from up here somewhere."

Without thought, Dean pointed down the left hallway, and let Sam go first, opening the doors one at a time until he paused, entire body stilling.

Inside, Dean could see Miranda's body crumpled on the floor, face nearly blue, lips skin tone. He'd thought about kissing her lips, when they'd been full and red, like foreign fruit. Now, he looked up and saw the light that she'd tied her makeshift noose to, saw where it had snapped under her weight, but not before she'd gone too long without air.

At night, with the lights out, when voices were almost anonymous, sometimes someone would say something they couldn't say at dinner or out in the yard. If you spoke right into the heating vents, everyone else could hear, too. Once someone had said, _Right before you die, I hear that you remember everything._

The words had been so quiet, Dean had sat up and pressed his ear to the vent, listening for more. Danny and the kid before Sam – Marcus? Michael? – had both been laying too still, as though the words had frozen them like a memory.

 _How do you know?_ Dean had whispered.

He'd stayed up half the night curled against the vent, until the three AM chime before he'd finally crawled back into bed, stiff and angry.

Now, Dean just sighed and reached into his pockets, fingers searching. On the floor, Sam was tugging her head out of the noose, his lips on Miranda's as soon as she was free. There was something familiar about how Sam raised her chin, tilting her head and pinched her nose.

Then he reached down, hands on her solar plexus and pushed one, two, three. As Sam reached for her mouth again, Dean turned his back and went to look at her desk. One of her black ballpoint pens had been used on the surface, digging deep and bloody into the wood.

 _I remember._

She must have written it over and over to get it that deep into the wood, Dean thought. Her roommates must have noticed. Someone must have seen. Touching the 'b', Dean wondered what he'd do if Danny did this. Or Sam.

There were footsteps on the stairs and Dean cocked his head for a second before he realized who it must be. Faster than he remembered moving in a while, he lunged for Sam, dragging him off Miranda.

"It's too late," Dean said, as Sam struggled against his shoulder. "It's too late. Let's _go_."

Sam elbowed him in the gut and Dean didn't even think before kicking Sam's legs out from under him and pressing a knee against Sam's chest.

"Let's go. They'll catch you and they'll really make you forget."

Below him, Sam glared, eyes dark, and in the shadows they almost looked black. Dean offered a hand for Sam to get up and pushed them into the room across the hall, his breath short and strangled.

Just as he closed the door behind them, he heard someone start down the left hallway, footsteps measured. When they paused outside of the door, Dean stopped breathing.

He could feel Sam pressed against his back, ear pressed to the door next to Dean. Sam's breath ruffled the hair at the back of Dean's neck, and Dean shivered like a cold sweat was clinging to him. Closing his eyes, he listened as though he could push the footsteps away from him, away from Sam.

Finally the footsteps moved through Miranda's door and Dean took a deep breath like he was breathing the first breath of summer air.

"What was that?" Sam asked, voice loud. "Dean?"

"Don't ask." Dean sat back, his back pressed against the thick wooden door, and he tried to keep his voice down, tried to tell Sam that this wasn't the time or place, but Sam exhaled angrily against Dean's neck.

Rolling his eyes up, Dean saw the cold white of the ceiling, the closet with girl's uniforms. He couldn't remember whose room this was, the names and faces slipping his mind, even though he was sure he'd had sex with one of them. Christine? Christine with the red hair and the tattoo she couldn't remember why she got?

Abruptly, he remembered the neon light of a tattoo parlor reflecting in his window, red then blue, red then blue. He was waiting for someone, and there was cold metal in his hands – no, crossed over his lap. It was the muzzle of a shot gun. Red, blue, and someone was breathing in time to it, but it wasn't him.

Sam nudged him, and said, "What are you afraid of?"

The memory stuck in cold fragments, and he shook his head, trying to forget, trying to remember more.

"I'm going to check and see if it's safe," Dean said, and turned to crack open the door. Miranda's door was closed and he listened until he was sure no one else was coming up the stairs.

Standing, he ran a hand down his pants and walked out, not caring if Sam was following.

To what Dean thought was his credit, Sam waited until they were outside – out into the chilly air and the scent of the lake – before he started asking questions.

"What was that?" Sam asked.

"Probably just a teacher," Dean lied. Out near the lakeshore, he could see a girl with her coat open and scarf thrown over her shoulder: bright red on the black wool.

He watched her instead of Sam, even when Sam shoved at him, pushing him into the wall of the school. In the distance, she hunched her shoulders and Dean knew how cold the lake could get when your feet were almost touching the shoreline. That close, this late in the fall, the water was almost like ice.

"Stop it. You aren't afraid of anything. You're _Dean_." Sam's voice was low and he was whispering right into Dean's ear.

Too quickly, Dean turned and shoved Sam away, crossing his arms over his chest as he stepped back. "Dude. What the hell are you talking about?"

"Jesus. You really don't remember," Sam settled back on his feet, his chin nearly touching his chest.

Absurdly, Dean was just glad they weren't talking about the Keeper anymore. On the shoreline, he couldn't see the girl anymore, but there weren't any ripples on the lake.

"That's the point," Dean said, slowly. "You really need to get with the program, Sammy."

"Don't... Don't call me that. My brother called me that." Sam took a slight step forward, and Dean felt himself automatically shifting back.

"That's from the then. You gotta forget all that. I'm not kidding. If they find out that you aren't even trying, they'll make you..." Dean shook his head. "It's easier. It gets easier."

" _Stop saying that_ ," Sam said, intensely. "My brother's name was Dean."

His eyes were on Dean's, and he reached out with one hand until he caught Dean's jacket. Awkwardly, Dean shifted away, but Sam hung on, pressing up into his space, his body so much larger than it had ever seemed before.

"You saying I'm your brother?" Dean laughed, and swiped at Sam's hand in a block that his body remembered. He didn't ask where he'd learned it, just shook off the memory of sweat and bloodied cotton on his skin.

"Yes."

It was almost painful how sincere Sam looked, how much Dean could tell he believed that. For a while, Danny had believed that he and Dean had been in love before the school. Sighing, Dean wrenched himself out of Sam's grasp.

"Well. I'm not. I'm not your brother." He had to be brutal, he knew, because Danny had spent too long in love with Dean before Dean had finally been able to say, _I'm straight_.

"Yes, you are, Dean. You just forgot for a while." Sam leaned in to whisper something else in Dean's ear and Dean didn't wait, just moved back and socked him hard.

Muscle memory moved him into a defensible stance, feet shoulder-width apart and hands fisted in front of him. Before, in the room, he hadn't remembered how he'd gotten Sam down on the ground and now he didn't know where to go from this position. He watched Sam touch his lip, watched Sam take a second look at Dean like he was finally really seeing Dean.

"Damnit, Sam. We're supposed to forget everything, but I'd remember that. I don't have a brother." Dean said the words firmly. He knew he'd remember a brother, knew that he wouldn't be able to forget something like that, someone like that.

The _then_ was a long, endless blank, but he'd remember that.

Suddenly, he remembered touching someone's hair as they knelt over a toilet bowl, head framed by the seat. His whole body was tense and he felt ill himself, but not from sickness, from fear. In his mind, he ran his fingers through curls and then shook his head.

"I'd remember," Dean reasserted. The memory cracked and faded and he turned to go inside. "You can find dinner yourself."

*****

He settled into bed before Danny, before Sam. His pajamas were too thin for the winter, and he shivered in his shirt, hand tucked under his pillow.

When Danny came in, he was noisy, hitting the table with his hip, stumbling to get his shoes off as he went over to Dean's bed. Closing his eyes, Dean wished that Danny had learned how to map out a room, the way that Dean knew he could map out their room and the cafeteria and the library without thought. Ingrained skills, he guessed.

"Dean. You asshole. Guess which school the new kid transferred in from?" Danny sat at the edge of Dean's bed, dragging blankets away from Dean's shoulder. Gritting his teeth, Dean waited Danny out. "Guess."

"Fuck off," Dean said, irritated.

"Special school," Danny giggled, nearing hysteria. "He was one of the specials, man. _And_ he wasn't even trying to forget. He kept asking what we remembered from the then."

Rolling onto his back, Dean watched shadows across the ceiling, the slither of vines moving with the sound of wind. "What'd you tell him?"

"That we didn't remember anything. And that he should stop asking." Danny shifted back a little and Dean watched the door out of the corner of his eye. Having a roommate who wanted to remember could be dangerous.

After a pause, Dean said, "Almost ran into a Keeper today."

Danny turned toward him and grabbed his leg, fingers digging in. Dean kicked him off, sitting up so he could face Danny. In the dark, it looked almost like Danny was younger than 18, young enough to be scared of the dark and the boogeymen.

"Where?" Danny whispered it, had to cough and repeat.

"Miranda hung herself. Sam went to go see." Dean could remember how he felt when he saw her body, and it hit him again, that sort of jealousy that hurt.

Danny shifted, his thigh brushing against Dean's. He whispered, "What did you tell him?"

"Nothing." Dean reached up for his neck again and came up against white cotton. "Just to forget."

"Yeah, he isn't doing that."

Dean glanced over to their window, the ivy crossing it in patterns. "Shit."

"He was a _special_ , man. I think we already have a few of them, right?"

Danny stood and Dean looked over at him – his body was hidden in the dark, but Dean knew that tone of voice, knew how his eyebrows would be pushed together.

"Yeah, I think." He knew the names, the faces, but they faded with forgetting, and he knew that if he tried to remember, they'd shatter. He couldn't think of a single name when he tried.

For a while Danny stood, staring, and Dean rubbed his eyes, blinking away the desire to punch Danny.

"Okay," Danny said. He went over to his corner and Dean lay back down on his side.

When he closed his eyes, he saw the lake, the blue of the gray sky on the water. It was almost like a dream.

******

Sam was still in bed when Dean got up, put on his jogging shoes and shorts. The morning was cool, but he went out into it anyway, circling the school before heading around the lake. It was quiet, barely sunrise, and he didn't stop when he saw a girl's hand caught in the reeds. As he passed, he caught a glimpse of blonde hair tangled, but he kept running.

Stay too long and someone else might show up.

For a second, in between steps, he remembered salt sticking to his skin and someone larger than him talking to him in a low voice. The hand on his shoulder had been firm, a wedding ring cold against his neck.

His foot hit the ground and he didn't even bother trying to keep the memory, just let it go, ice on water. Before he went back in, he reached down and picked up a stone, palm sized. It fit neatly into his pocket, banging against his thigh as he ran, bruising.

Danny was already at breakfast after Dean showered, and he slid into his uniform and tie quickly. He glanced over and saw Sam struggling with his tie, fingers awkwardly wrinkling the silk.

"Stop it," Dean said. Sam looked over, surprised and handed over the tie when Dean opened his hand for it.

Wrapping it around his neck, he made quick work of the knot, keeping it loose so that Sam could tighten it himself. He left without waiting for Sam, and was halfway down their hallway when Sam caught up, adjusting the tie around his neck. Sam's legs were longer, but Dean refused to walk fast to keep up.

"Thanks," Sam said, slowing.

"I'm still not who you think I am," Dean said.

Sam's lips tightened, his whole body tensing. "I know you think that-"

"What do you remember about him, your brother?" Dean knew the question was unfair, but they were almost at the cafeteria and he didn't want to still be talking about this with all of those ears listening. Rules were rules.

Don't remember. Report people trying.

Sam had stopped behind him, and Dean glanced back, saw raw fear and illness. Looking down, Dean forced himself into the cafeteria, into the buffet line. It had been unfair, but he wasn't going to rock the boat.

By the time Dean was halfway through his second helping of waffles, Sam had made his way into the cafeteria, and sat across from Dean without a tray. His hands were fisted on the table, knuckles dry and white.

Somewhere, a plate shattered and there was laughter chopping through the room, but Dean noticed Sam didn't even look towards the noise, not the way he'd turned towards Miranda's room when she'd hung herself. Instead, he clenched his fists impossibly tighter and Dean saw him fighting a shiver.

"What did they do to me?" Sam asked. His voice sounded like his fists looked – carefully controlled by sheer will.

"Can't remember him?" Dean kept his voice pitched low, but not low enough to be a whisper.

"What - I can't remember what he looked like."

Dean's waffles were getting soggy from the syrup and he took a quick bite of bacon, shoving it in and chewing. "Yeah. You can't remember what color his hair was, or what he liked to wear, or, you know, what his favorite movie was."

The shaking in Sam's hands knocked a ring against the table top in an uneven rhythm. Dean took a bite of scrambled eggs, the taste too oily and salty.

"You're forgetting," Dean said, like that wasn't obvious. "Don't try to remember. It's not worth it."

Sam slapped his hands together, the sound short and abrupt. Quickly, Dean glanced around, but no one was paying attention.

"I still think you're my... Dean. I think you're my brother."

Pursing his lips, Dean pushed away his tray, the syrup-soaked waffles and greasy eggs.

"You don't even remember what he looked like," Dean said. "You don't remember anything about him, except that you think you had a brother and you think his name was Dean. I'm one of the first guys you met. You don't think that's a coincidence that you think your brother's name is Dean?"

Sam looked down and away, towards where the pack of girls a table over were gesturing and talking with their hands.

"No," Sam said, but his voice was quiet and miserable.

"I'll be out in the yard when you stop trying to get yourself hurt," Dean said.

He went to find Danny. They had a game of chess to play.

*****

The breeze that came up over the lake touched his lips, and Dean closed his eyes without thinking about the girl from that morning, the blonde with one hand reaching through the reeds.

Behind him, he heard someone picking their way through the bushes, the crack of dead branches and the sound of uneven breathing.

"Hey," Danny said, coming up behind him. Dean closed his eyes, and felt the breeze. "What if we invited him to the game?"

It took a moment to understand that Danny really was suggesting that.

"I think that'd be a bad plan," Dean said. "He's having trouble letting go, and you want to invite him to the game? Why don't you just wave a red flag in front of a bull instead?"

Danny bent and picked up a flat stone to toss across the water.

"I invited him already."

Dean pursed his lips, and walked away. "Fine."

He had a few hours to prepare, anyway. It was his turn, and damn it if Sam was going to mess up this for him.

*****

He met up with two of them five past one at the old stables. The horses were long gone, but it was far enough from the school that the Keepers wouldn't come out this far unless they had reason to. Dean didn't say anything to Jake or Will when he turned on the faucet for the trough.

The pipes squealed loudly, and at first the water was just a slow, cold trickle, barely enough to fill the bottom. Jake reached across the trough and gave it another twist, until the water came out in a swift gush, filling the trough a quarter of the way, then a half, before Danny and Sam came into the stables.

For a second no one said anything, then Jake said, tense, "Who's this?"

"Our new roommate," Dean said, firmly. He glared hard at Danny. There'd been a reason he hadn't woken either of them before he'd left.

Danny frowned and Sam looked at Jake with narrowed eyes. For a second, Dean wanted to protect Sam, even though this hadn't been his idea. He turned on Jake.

"Okay. We going to do this or have a fucking tea party?"

Behind him, Sam shifted, and without looking, Dean knew that there'd be curiosity on his face, the open sort that meant Danny probably hadn't told him shit. The game was hard to explain before you saw it.

Will had shut off the water when it was full and Dean pulled off his black hoodie. His breath was uneven when he looked at the water.

"What're you doing?" Jake asked.

"It's my turn," Dean said, glancing up, briefly. "You went last time."

Jake took a deep breath, as though to speak and paused, uncertain. A sense of deep unease went through the group, Dean saw Will shift away, towards the door.

"I forgot," Jake said, his voice quiet. "I _forgot_."

"It's okay," Danny said, crossing to him. "It's not a big deal."

Will shifted again, and Dean knew he was about to run.

"Will. Come tie up my arms." Dean didn't watch Jake and Danny, that terror that they were all feeling now. Jake hadn't just been forgetting the then, he was forgetting the now.

Bringing the rope with him, Will moved around Jake and Danny over to Dean. Before he could wrap the rope, Sam said, "What's going on?"

The words broke the quiet stillness and Jake said, angry and aggressive, "You didn't tell him?"

"It's just a game," Dean said, and crossed his wrists behind his back, relieved when he felt Will moving again, brushing his wrists with the rough rope.

"Why's he tying you up?" Sam asked, quieter.

"Sometimes people don't like being drowned," Jake said.

"Jake," Dean's voice was sharp but it was too late, Sam was already tugging off the loose rope and pulling at Dean.

"No. No, Dean," Sam said. "What the hell – "

"Sam." This time, Dean made his voice as much of an order as he could, as sharp as he'd ever spoken. He could feel the tremor of Sam's hand against his shoulder, the fight to obey and the desire to get out of there, to get Dean out, obvious in Sam's expression.

"It's not for real," Dean said, gentling. "You just almost drown."

"No, Dean. How can you think that this is a good idea?"

Dean stared at Sam hard, urging him to understand without Dean having to explain it. Between them, Dean knew, intimately, that there was a history he couldn't name. They weren't brothers, Dean knew, he'd remember that. Something else, though.

It felt like if he could just put his finger on their relationship, he'd know how to talk to Sam. He'd know how to make him listen about the forgetting, about the game, about even the Keepers.

"Sam," Dean used that deep voice again, the one that just touched on the edge of his memory. He didn't try to pick it up and examine it, knew it'd melt in his hands, but still, he used that tone.

"Okay," Sam said, softly, broken. "Okay."

Without saying anything else, he spun Dean and tied efficient knots around his wrists. When Dean tugged, the knots tightened, and he knew that they were better knots than Will would have tied. Carefully, Dean sank to his knees in front of the water, shoulders aching a little.

Under his legs, the ground was rough, and he could still smell manure this close. For a second all he was aware of was the silence, four other people breathing in the quiet. He didn't need to glance over to see Danny and Jake getting ready.

Behind him, Will asked, "You want a blindfold?"

"No," Dean shook his head. "I'm ready."

"Say goodnight, Dean," Jake said. Something in his voice was quiet, though not cruel. His hand was on Dean's right shoulder and Danny's was on his left and then they both shoved at once, pushing him under.

For the first thirty seconds, Dean felt nothing, the air he held in his lungs was enough and then all of a sudden, he had to breathe. The hands holding him under were too strong and the ropes cut into his wrists and he needed to get _out_ , he was going to die, the water was going to get into his lungs –

It was a school day and he'd just finished packing two sack lunches into plastic bags from the supermarket. The sandwiches were standard PB&J and there were a couple of applesauces that he'd won from some kids yesterday. He was looking forward to winning more snacks today, something Sammy would like, when the door burst open, and his father stumbled in, bloody and filthy.

He smelled like urine and vomit and said, "Dean-" just a second before he collapsed onto the floor.

There was the sound of someone else running in from the other room and Dean pulled his father flat onto the kitchen floor and said, "Close the door-"

Someone else followed his father inside, though, and when he looked up, yellow eyes stared back. His hand was wrapped around Sammy's arm, and as much as Sam struggled he couldn't get free.

"Say goodbye to your brother, Sam," the man said.

Suddenly, he was on his back, someone saying his name loudly. If he said it any louder someone was going to hear. Dean coughed up water and bile and the taste burned his throat, made him turn onto his side and cough into the old hay.

The scent was too much for his nose, he felt like he'd never get the taste of metallic water out of his mouth, or the scent of horse shit out of his nose.

There was a hand on the back of his head, brushing the hair and the skin of his neck.

"Shh," Sam said, and Dean realized he was crying a little bit.

"What'd you remember?" Jake asked, insistent, nearly manic with the question.

"Dean, c'mon, before it fades," Danny said.

"I," Dean coughed out phlegm and the aftertaste of water. "I remembered my dad. He was this tall guy, dark hair. I think I remember him dying."

He was surprised, realized that that's what the memory must be. He could already feel the edges of it cracking, fine ice under the pressure of the now.

"And there was someone else," Dean said. "Someone..."

"Who?" Sam asked right next to him, hand stilling on his neck. "Who, Dean?"

Dean gritted his teeth and turned his face against the pavement. It hurt, the whole thing hurt and Dean couldn't think with Sam right there and Danny and Jake and Will.

"It's gone," he said, mouth nearly brushing the ground.

"Fuck," Jake said, standing. "Fuck. I want to go again."

"One per game," Danny said.

"C'mon, Jake," Will was too far away to still be on the ground next to him. Dean heard them walk off, Will taking two steps to keep up with Jake. He'd seen them walk like that before, could almost picture it.

He knew that he'd already forgotten something too important to name, something that he should remember.

"Let's get him back," he heard Danny say to Sam, and then Dean felt Danny's cool fingers on his arm, pushing him into a sitting position and forcing the hoodie back over his head.

Sam was stronger, though, and by the time the two of them had walked him back to the door into the school, Dean could keep his own feet under him, was nearly walking on his own. He paused to lean against their doorway as they shoved open the door, kept his hands in his pockets until he tried to take a step and his knees gave out.

Faster than Danny, Sam reached out and wrapped both arms around Dean, pressing them chest to chest as he dragged Dean into the room. He tossed Dean back down on his bed, helped pull off his shoes.

"We should get him out of his wet clothes," Sam said. "He'll get sick."

"Yeah, because it'd be a real tragedy to get sick when I could let the school do its job and kill me itself," Dean said, against the pillow.

He didn't struggle when Sam reached for his clothes, stripping him down and searching through his trunk for his sleep pants.

When Dean rolled over to sleep, he told himself that the images were just dreams.

*****

Dean woke at the same time he always did, and already had his running gear on when he tugged on his hoodie and found it still damp. It came back, all of a sudden, that rush, the dump of memory and the near-immediate loss.

Dean pulled on the hoodie anyway and stumbled down the stairs, bitter. Before he'd even finished circling the school, Sam had caught up with him, clearly just out of bed, hair messy and face pressed from the pillow.

Slowing to give him a second to catch his breath, Dean started them towards the lake. Sam was smart enough not to say anything until they were almost there.

"I remembered something last night."

Losing his balance, Dean stumbled, caught himself at the last second and kept running. He was in better shape than Sam and it was beginning to show. Sam's harsh breathing cut up his words.

"You shouldn't try to do that," Dean said.

Ignoring him, Sam continued, "I remember a lot of the people here from before. At least I think I do. I think... We're all specials. We're all from the special school, and maybe they sent us here to-"

"Forget," Dean filled in, unable to stop himself. "Danny sometimes asks. Danny asks what we're supposed to be trying to forget."

He didn't like the answer, and so he sped up, reaching ahead of Sam and getting to the lakeshore before him. Automatically, he glanced in the water and stopped. The hair was familiar, the face distorted with water and Dean didn't think before reaching in and pulling out the body.

"No," he said, pressing down on Danny's chest. "Danny. God. It was your turn next, dude."

After a moment, he realized that Sam was pulling him off, using his whole body to shove Dean off the path into the bushes. When he realized that someone was coming, Dean let himself be pulled.

Sam flattened them both onto the ground, muffling his harsh breathing with his arm. Dean stilled his chest, felt the blood rush to his head, felt the tremor in his muscles. As in shape as he was, his body didn't like stopping without a warm down.

The waves of the lake become swiftly more muffled, the sound nearly disappearing and Dean just watched, watched like he'd never had the strength to before. Next to him, he noticed Sam staring, eyes wide at the Keeper.

Someone once whispered into the vents that Keepers were just ghost stories.

After the Keeper left, the lake began making sounds again, the bushes began moving in the breeze.

"Do you know what that was?" Sam whispered.

"A Keeper," Dean said. "You don't want to run into one."

"That was a _Reaper_ , Dean. A fucking corporeal Reaper. No one should be able to see those." Sam was gripping tight to a rock and Dean reached over to pry it out of his fingers.

"It doesn't matter," Dean said. Even though he thought it must. The word dragged up something in him, a near-memory, a part of one.

He stood and jogged back the way they'd come, working the pain out of his muscles. He didn't look behind him to see if Sam followed.

*****

Back in his school uniform, he checked to make sure Sam was still in the shower before heading back down to the lake, hands deep in his pockets. It was reassuring, how much things still stayed the same.

It was slightly warmer this late in the day, but the area around the lake was almost always empty. Students only came down to the lake to do one thing.

Dean walked in until the water was up to his knees, then kept walking. He could feel the water on his clothes, making his limbs unwieldy and heavy. There were rocks in all of his pockets, and he felt their weight; he almost couldn't walk with them.

If he had a brother, if Sam was his brother, he should protect him, should try to get him out of this place. But Dean knew, intimately, what Sam hadn't figured out yet. There was no out. There was just a blank space in everyone's head where memories should go.

Dean wanted that taste of memory again.

The lake had a steep shelf, an abrupt ledge that Dean found by falling off of it.

This was how he could help Sam, when he couldn't help himself. If he was gone, Sam would stop trying to remember his brother, would stop looking, might be able to get out through graduating. Some people had graduated, Dean knew. He couldn't remember their names or faces, but he knew that they had.

For a moment, he thought that he'd go quietly. Then he remembered what he'd forgotten. That yellow-eyed bastard holding Sam, pulling him out of Dean's life and leaving Dean with a dead father on the kitchen floor and a single mission: save Sammy.

The surface was too far above him and Dean struggled to reach it, but was held down by the rocks. He couldn't get into his pants while they were wet, couldn't struggle out of them. Reaching down to the lake bottom, he searched for anything he could use to cut off his clothes, let him get free.

His fingers touched wood and metal, and he blinked open his eyes to try to see. Through his eyelashes, he saw a chest guarded with... _runes_ he suddenly remembered. It was unlocked, just clasped closed. Urgently, Dean opened it, reached in to look for anything he could use.

Inside, he brushed across something cool and familiar like ice under his fingertips and was hit suddenly with

sunday school dress all white and pretty until she spilled communion wine all over it and Mary Pat's hands on his ass dragging him into a corner to make out until the teachers caught them and he found the bunny under the porch and fed it and talked to it every day until it let him pick it up and he was climbing a mountain with his sister and they were halfway up when she fell, shattering her leg and he only remembered the white of the hospital when he got out, but they said that he'd had to go in for two emergency surgeries and his mother's hair smelled like jasmine and the sun on her hands was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

Everyone's memories exploded out of the chest, and Dean fought to separate out his even as the others disappeared before he could untangle them from his own. The chest, he realized, it had to have been a trap for remembering -

His father, bent over the motel table, tools arranged neatly beside the wooden box. He pointed out the runes he was using to Dean, the one to keep whatever was inside locked inside. And this one for safety, and this one to hide it, and this one to keep the ghosts from seeing it, and this one...

His whole life suddenly filled him, everything he'd forgotten bloomed full Technicolor in Dean's brain and he struggled again with his pants, desperate for the first time since he'd arrived. He wondered briefly, if everyone else was getting back what they'd lost, the memories that filled them out and made them terrifyingly real.

All of a sudden, there were hands around his waist, a knife slicing off the button and Dean was free, pulling himself up to the surface, taking his first breath of real air.

Next to him, Sam broke the surface, hair plastered to his face, water, running down his nose.

"Sam?" Dean asked, and reached out to touch his baby brother. "Jesus, you got big."

"It's only been two years, Dean," Sam said. They were treading water but Sam didn't jerk away from the touch.

Shaking his head, Dean swam for the shore.

"C'mon. We've got things to get caught up on. We've got demon ass to kick," Dean shook water out of his hair as he stood. "Yellow-eyed bastard is using Reapers. God. Why didn't I see it before?"

"Azazel," Sam said. "His name's Azazel."

Dean looked over, and saw the history that two years could put between them. It wasn't fair and it wasn't right and Dean was going to make the bastard pay.

Students were flowing out of the school, confused and screaming. Some reached the shore by the time Dean dragged himself up. If they were specials, it meant that they had power. Power they'd be relearning, just figuring out again.

Behind him, Dean heard Sam move to flank him. Dean reached out, grabbed Sam's forearm and dug in his nails.

He could use that, knew that he would to keep Sammy safe.

*****

end.


End file.
